The general public in the Western world will be able to purchase the MIT/Negroponte OLPC ($100 laptop) after all. The catch? "customers will have to buy two laptops at once – with the second going to the developing world." Looks like eBay will be handling the sales and the laptop will initially go for around $300 for the citizens Western, industrial countries (read: U.S., Canada, & Europe). Brilliant move, I say. (via Newsvine) Check out the official OLPC site for more on the project.
Not so fast. Apparently, the BBC got it wrong and OLPC will not have a consumer version nor will they being do the buy-2-get-1 scheme, at least not yet. I still say that’s a great idea, although it won’t really buy enough to make much of a difference I suspect.